After a celebrated run across the pond, Canned Goods by Erik Kahn makes its London premiere at Southwark Playhouse - a theatre that has fast established itself as an engine room for new writing and was the launchpad for current West End hits The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and the Olivier Award-sweeping Operation Mincemeat. Similar to Mincemeat, Canned Goods hinges itself around an obscure but pivotal WWII military operation, but unfortunately doesn’t quite hit the mark.

Kahn’s play explores the execution of Hitler’s false flag operation and the war prisoners – the eponymous ‘canned goods’ - who were used to make it happen. Mostly set in a prison cell, each of the three prisoners are given their turn to monologue about their lives, their politics and their wartime hardships, in a structure that quickly becomes repetitive and formulaic.

Canned Goods seems uncertain of itself and what it wants to achieve. The premise is an interesting one, and there are certainly some interesting themes around deception and the violent theatrics of war - although the epilogue could do with a redraft that doesn’t wallop you over the head with metaphors. The characters feel like types rather than people – the wise, intellectual Jew, the humble yet wise farmer, the abrasive and uneducated Nazi-sympathiser. Their relationship to each other and the leering SS Major is stilted, confusing and ultimately static. This could be a simple question of structure, as the division of scenes makes it initially unclear if these men have been cell mates for hours or days.

The influence of Beckett is palpable in this liminal drama and although the sense of unease is somewhat successful, there is less suspense and mystery than frustrating opacity and deliberate obfuscation. The philosophical musings that occupy the prisoners veer towards trite and as a result the script feels full of empty space.

The design team on this show are, however, to be applauded. Ryan Joseph Stafford’s lighting design is brilliantly effective, broadening the sense of time, perspective and atmosphere that lacks in the script, and Mona Camille’s costume design is remarkably authentic. The staging of this production in the round effectively draws the audience in, exposing them to the players and each other in a bald and stark manner, that would be effective were the script able to deliver the final punch.

A limp drama that saves its ammo until slightly too late.

** Two stars

Reviewed by: Livvy Perrett

Canned Goods plays at Southwark Playhouse Borough until 8 February, with further info here.